Americans, it seems, are addicted to cable TV. Like every other addiction, we need our hit so bad that we’ll ignore the realities of our financial situation—we’re all going broke, fast—in order to watch Entourage and Down and Dirty with Jim Norton.
It goes like this: with people tightening their belts around the country (and world) they’re going to have to cut back on luxuries. Thing thing is, for whatever reason, Americans don’t view cable TV (and cellphones!) as a luxury; we need it, even though we could be saving a nice chunk of change (around $100 I’m guessing… that’s what I used to pay) by eliminating it from the family budget.
Next week is when a lot of the big cable companies, like Comcast and Time Warner, report their third quarter earnings. That’s when we’ll see whether or not the current financial crisis, which started in earnest in September, has affected their cable TV consumption habit.
Further evidence: sales of HDTVs this holiday shopping season aren’t expected to be all that bad. Maybe sales won’t be great, but people are still expected to spend a few dollars on plasmas and LCDs.
For the readers in the audience, be sure to check out Amusing Ourselves to Death, a book that says, essentially, our society is doomed because the only thing people do all day long is watch TV.
I know that in this crisis I am guilty of this too. Granted I share bills with two other roommates and don’t plan on buying a plasma T.V. but I have no plans of discontinuing my basic cable subscription. Although I have recently gotten rid of HBO to save a few dollars.
At this point, I’ve canceled all of my premium channels. However, I can’t bring myself to going cold turkey on cable. It’s the only money I spend on entertainment.
I own a site just about TV’s and well I haven’t noticed even a slight drop in sales
I gave up the cable about 4 months ago and I really haven’t missed that much, I bought a couple of dvd’s on the net every month (special prices) and I’ve stayed entertained, now I’m growing a movie collection along with a savings account. Recently I also gave up my cell phone contract and bought a Net10 phone - wow, I never thought I could save as much as I have. I still make the same amount of calls but I’m saving about $40 every month. It’s because I’m not paying those hidden costs, just 10 cents a minute. At this rate I’m going to give up the land line as well and I know that if I can hold off temptation I’ll have a very tidy emergency fund and maybe a holiday fund too.